


Language Lesson

by destiel by iswyn (iswyn)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Flower Shop, M/M, almost entirely fluffy, with one mild sexual innuendo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-31
Updated: 2016-12-31
Packaged: 2018-09-13 18:08:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9135508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iswyn/pseuds/destiel%20by%20iswyn
Summary: Dean runs a flower shop that used to be his mother's. He's not really interested in flowers other than as a means to an end, but one night he gets an unexpected customer who changes his point of view.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the [supernatural prompt challenge](http://supernaturalpromptchallenge.tumblr.com/post/152590639642/welcome-to-the-fourth-round-of-the-supernatural) on Tumblr.
> 
> My challenge: ‘I work part-time in a flower shop and you keep asking me about what this flower means in flower language and I honestly don’t know so you end up giving me a lesson’ (Florist AU)
> 
> I made a few little changes, but really, who ever writes a prompt exactly as given?

“Do you want me to put the nasturtium away, Mr. Winchester?” the kid asks timidly.

He’s been working at April Showers for almost a month now, but still seems to be laboring under the misapprehension that Dean is going to bite him or something. Dean figures since he can’t afford to pay more than minimum wage, he can’t afford to be a douchey boss.

“You gotta stop calling me that, Kev,” he says, taking a step back to look at the flower arrangement he’s been working on. He looks over at the kid, who’s hovering at the edge of the counter near a couple of containers of flowers. “You mean the purple ones? Yeah, you can put those away. The leftover white ones, too.”

Dean doesn’t really know that much technical information about flowers. He has a hard time remembering Latin names for plants, and honestly, he doesn’t know why anyone cares. They’re pretty, they smell nice, and if you put them in an aesthetically pleasing arrangement, people will buy them. Dean is good at that part. Mom always said he was a natural at arranging flowers back when she was running the shop. Sam said he was a savant, which may or may not have prompted Dean to throw a vase in the general direction of his head.

“Hey Kevin?” He calls when the boy comes back out of the cooler.

The kid freezes. “Yes, Sir?”

Great. It’s sir, now. Any day now he’s gonna get home, look in the mirror, and see his dad. “You said you had a thing you needed to do tonight?”

“Oh, um, it’s not important if—”

“Nah,” Dean waves a hand. “It’s dead here, man. I gotta finish the Henderson wedding centerpieces tonight, but there’s no reason you gotta stay. Go on, do your thing.”

He leans in to tweak a stem, to make sure the placement is perfect. Just enough blue interspersed with the white to keep it from looking like a funeral arrangement.  He gets the white roses thing, really he does, it’s just… no. Okay, he doesn’t get it. White for a wedding is some kind of Victorian tradition thing, but isn’t the dress enough white? Maybe throw in some more color? If it were him, he’d pick all those crazy bright technicolor daisies. Gerbera, he thinks.

See? He’s totally learning. Maybe when he’s owned the shop as long as Mom did, he’ll know the names of all the things.

Not five minutes after Kevin leaves, the bell over the door jingles. That’s what he gets for letting the kid go on his date: customers. Probably some little old lady who’s gonna pinch his cheek, and it’s a fifty-fifty thing which kind of cheek she’ll go for.

Giving the arrangement he’s finished one last bit of tape before putting it on the cart, he absently calls out, “be with you in a minute,” before taking the finished piece into the cooler to await pickup in the morning. He just has one more to finish for tomorrow, but with his luck, the little old lady is gonna want to talk about the sick friend or dead husband she’s buying the flowers for, and he’ll end up stuck in the shop till midnight trying to catch up.

He may whine about it to himself, but it’s not like he’s gonna turn away an old lady who wants to talk about her dead husband.

He pulls the emptied cart behind him, pausing a moment before opening the cooler door to put on his best ‘I don’t hate customers’ smile, and stops short when he sees the man standing at the counter. The smile slides right off, and he’s a little concerned that if he doesn’t get his face under control, there’ll be drool involved.

What? He’s got a weakness for hot guys in suits. Totally not his fault. Too much James Bond as a kid has him programmed to get a boner when he sees a hot guy in a suit.

The guy at the counter wears that suit well. The trench coat he’s wearing over the suit is a little big, but it works. Dean doesn’t even want to think about the sex hair. That has the potential to make things uncomfortable both literally and figuratively.

He’s holding two nearly identical bouquets of flowers—the same variety, but one red and one yellow. They’re the kind Dean thinks of as sick friend or going to see grandma flowers, not date flowers, so maybe he should replace his failed customer service smile with his best boyishly charming one. It may be silly, but it totally works most of the time.

Dean clears his throat. “Can I uh, help you?”

The man looks up from his flowers, a perplexed expression on his face. A very handsome face, of course. Dude looks amazing, is wearing an expensive suit, has gorgeous lips and the bluest eyes ever. He’s way out of Dean’s league.

He holds up the flowers. “I don’t remember. Do yellow and red zinnias mean the same thing?”

“Huh?” Dean asks, oh-so-intelligently. He pretends he’s not just staring at the hot guy’s mouth, thinking about how incredibly deep that voice is.

“Zinnias,” the man says, holding up the two bouquets. “They’re for thinking of friends, but are yellow and red the same?”

Dean is no closer to an understanding than before the explanation. “They’re for…” part of him wants to try bullshitting his way through the conversation. It usually works for him. If he wants any chance at a date, though, it’s a terrible idea. “No idea, man. I just sell ‘em. I don’t ask ‘em questions.”

“You don’t have to learn the meaning of flowers to work here?” the man asks. He sounds genuinely surprised at the notion.

“Um, no?” He rubs the back of his neck absently. “I, uh, I don’t even know what most of ‘em are called. I’m okay at making ‘em look pretty, but I don’t really know stuff about flowers.”

The guy cocks his head and squints at Dean for a moment, before nodding. “That does make sense. Working here doesn’t mean you have to know all about flower meanings. It’s not as though you own the place.”

Dean blushes bright red. “Um. I, uh—”

“You own the place?” The man asks, a hint of amusement in his shiver-inducing voice.

“Kinda, yeah. Sorry.” Dean sighs. “It, um, it was my mom’s shop till six months ago. She woulda known all about your, um,” he waves at the flowers. “Your flower meaning stuff.”

At that, the man’s face transforms from mild amusement to… something Dean can’t decipher. He sets the bouquets down on the counter and pulls out his phone. Dean suspects he’s looking on yelp for a different flower shop.

“Mixed,” he says after a moment.

“Huh?”

“Mixed are for an absent friend. Yellow for remembrance and red for love.” He turns his phone off and slips it back into his pocket. “So I guess I’ll take both.”

Dean snorts. “That’s silly.” He grabs the bouquets and starts stripping them apart. “There’s white ones and pink ones of this kind, too. You want some of each in there?”

“Oh, I can’t—you don’t have to—” the man puts up his hands to stop Dean.

“Dude, it’s for your friend, right? You don’t want it to mean the wrong thing.” Dean holds up a hand. “I’ll be right back, man.”

He runs over to grab the other varieties of—zinnias?—from their spot in the shop, and bring a bouquet of each back with him. He proceeds to pull all four apart and put together one with a few of each shade. He kind of likes the way they look together. He thinks mom used to do them that way sometimes, and he’s not sure why he stopped.

Hot guy looks astonished. “It’s so kind of you to do this.”

“Nah, man, it’s no problem.” Dean is totally lying. For any other customer, he would have complained about having to do something like this. Not that he had to do it now, he’s just a sucker for a pretty face. “So is your friend okay?”

“He’s fine. He just had an emergency appendectomy, and he’s going to be in the hospital a few days. I thought I’d bring flowers when I visit.” The man gives a half smile. “He’s a big baby, so I thought maybe flowers would keep him from complaining too much.”

“Ha! Sounds like when my little brother had his tonsils out,” Dean says, shaking his head. “You’d think a big dude like him would be able to handle some pain, but the second he came around, it was all whining all the time.”

The guy laughs. “That sounds about right.”

“I, uh, I’m Dean, by the way.” Dean tries hard not to blush or fidget, but he thinks he’s being obvious, and it makes him twitchy.

“Castiel,” the man answers.

“Wow. That’s a mouthful,” Dean says, then blushes at the double entendre. “I mean, um, it’s not your everyday Tom, Dick, or Harry.”

“It’s an angel name; my parents were religious,” Castiel explains. He starts blushing too, and Dean can’t decide if that’s a good thing or a bad one. “I suppose it is a mouthful. I think it’s, uh, probably better than your everyday Dick, though.”

Oh, a good thing. Definitely a good one.

“Oh really?” Dean leans across the flower-littered counter and holds out the finished bouquet. “A guy likes to judge these things for himself, ya know?”

“I—” Castiel reaches to take the flowers, his fingers stopping to hover just over Dean’s. “That sounds like a good idea.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Dean does have to stay at the shop until midnight to make three bouquets out of the remaining zinnias and finish the last centerpiece. He doesn’t have the slightest urge to complain about it, though.

In fact, he stays half an hour later consulting google about what flowers one should take on a first date.


End file.
